


Amber Makes a Friend

by locusinbloom (Fractual_Visions)



Category: Thor - All Media Types
Genre: Bipolar Disorder, Depression, F/M, Suicide Attempt, community: naughtylokiconfessions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-07
Updated: 2014-05-07
Packaged: 2018-01-23 22:27:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1581674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fractual_Visions/pseuds/locusinbloom
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She's hurting and alone and about to take her life. Loki isn't much for a gaurdian angel, but that's what's on offer.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Amber Makes a Friend

**Author's Note:**

> Done for the [Naughty Loki Confessions](http://naughtylokiconfessions.tumblr.com) blog of which I am a devoted follower.

Crisp leaves and the coming of Winter filled the air. Off in the distance, an ambulance siren wailed. The ambulance reminded her of death. The changing of the seasons reminded her of death. Somewhere out there, in the vastness of the realms, the Holly King is girding up to do battle with the Oak King. Everything reminds Amber of death and her own world feels so small.

Before, the thoughts had crashed and echoed, the private beach of her mind almost too tiny to contain them all. She was afraid that she would simply be swallowed up by the ever-changing fluidity of the cosmos: a brilliance she could see with her eyes closed or in the bottom of a drinking glass or a few strands of hair.

Now her mind was empty.

Also, alone. A quiet abandoned house. Nobody but her and the gentle creaking of the floorboards. Which shouldn’t creak in an empty house and so kept her curled into herself. It was coming. They were. Something was. It was a tight and constant ball of fear that held her laughing in its grip.

Her mind, which could hold in its imagination all the whirling mechanisms that set the stars dancing in the sky, had contracted to a single dark room. Just a bed and a door.

It was hard to breathe. It was hard to think. The weight over her shoulders was a simple bookbag, filled with lead bricks. People looked at her, and that felt strange, to be looked at, but they didn’t see. They saw Amber. An ordinary girl, pretty much like all the others they had ever seen. They didn’t see where she was being crushed like an ant under the tire tracks of a machine that raged and raged and never quieted.

Why didn’t they see? Was she not screaming loud enough or were they just not listening? Whichever. It didn’t matter, because it was soon going to end. She needed it to end.

Amber left the bed in her mind in order to climb out of her physical bed and grab a couple of spare razors on her way to the bathroom. It had to end now. There was no point in putting it off until morning.

She found a comfortable spot near the tub—no sense in being uncomfortable for her own suicide. She picked up a razor and held it near her wrist. Just do it quickly, her mind insisted. Don’t think. An intense pressure built in her chest. In the surety of her closing death, she did not question the arms which encircled her or the strong hands which gripped her wrists and pulled the blade away from the vein. Did not ask from where they came or to whom they belonged.

Amber already knew who it was. Loki. Her king. The longer he did not speak and she did not turn around, the more time she could savour that sweet illusion in her mind. It would hurt to see yet another shred of comfort ripped away.

At last, she gathered her courage. It wasn’t family, she knew that. They would be yelling, crying, asking questions. Not a neighbour either or they would have rushed to explain their presence. Maybe a burglar, Amber thought. That would be exciting. She turned.

Green eyes met hers and her world fell apart. Loki was real and everything she had ever believed in was a lie. Except him. She believed in him and he had come. An angel to lift her up where her spirit had given way. She looked to the discarded razor with puzzlement. It seemed now like an alien which had crawled into her lap. What was she supposed to do with this?

"What took you so long?"

"Contrary to popular opinion, I am not omniscient." His tone was haughty. "It is only by fortunate accident that I turned the gaze of Hliðskjálf to this house on this night.”

"I don’t believe in accidents," Amber said.

"Neither do I," Loki said drily. "Especially since I have met the witches who cause them. No doubt there is some lesson or punishment in my presence here tonight."

"Maybe you were just supposed to be here to save me."

Loki snorted derisively. “People who need ‘saved’ don’t deserve to live.”

"That’s…" A few tears drained over Amber’s already wet cheeks. "That’s a pretty callous thing to say. Doesn’t it matter when people are hurting?"

"Does it?"

Amber picked up the razor, turning it end over end, contemplatively.

"Do you ever hurt?" She asked.

Loki said nothing, didn’t even blink.

"I hurt all the time," she whispered. "The voices in my head get loud. They say confusing, awful things. They scream and I scream with them, but silently, so nobody hears, so nobody is bothered by my worthless self. I was screaming silently. Until tonight."

She shifted to wrap her arms around his leg and buried her face in the leather. Amber sighed.

"When my king came to rescue me. If you can care about me—"

"—will you! Stop. Your pathetic romantic idealism." Loki snapped. "I told you it was an accident."

"But you came!" She was begging, to be heard or for reassurance or something she didn’t even understand. "Does it really hurt so much to be kind? I am small. Am I too small to fit in your heart?"

"I walk everywhere and see all that I wish. In the nine realms, I have seen wonders and terrors that would break your mind. Sometimes I believe that Yggdrasil is a single tree in a forest and I am the bird who thinks his branch is the whole world."

Loki petted Amber’s hair and said nothing for a long while.

"Sometimes," he finished, "I feel small."

"This is just a dream. I wasn’t meant to be here tonight."

"Where did you mean to be? I don’t know anything about your magic throne thing, but it seems like a rather huge coincidence that you happened to look in my bathroom just that very moment."

"There is a park near here which I may find of some use in my future schemes and sometimes my gaze…"

The silence stretched out and out.

"… but why lie? I desired a place to end life. Here is what I saw."

"You came here to kill yourself?” Amber’s eyes couldn’t have been much wider if she tired.

"Why surprised? Was that not your intent also? And look, you brought extra blades for me, how considerate."

"No! You can’t!" Amber’s voice, bright with panic.

"Can’t I?" His anger was cold and dismissive.

"Not yet." Think, Amber, think. "Why did you stop me?"

"I didn’t want your blood on my clothes." His face was nearly expressionless, but a tiny flick of a smile pulled the left corner of his mouth.

"You cared!" Happiness raced through Amber. "And if you cared for a minute, maybe you could care for a few more days?"

"You demand an outrageous amount of my time."

"The time you are planning to end?" Tears started to fall all over again."What are a few days to a god? You can afford to be patient, to be kind. To stay and care for me. Can’t you?"

Their gazes settled together. For just a second the mask fell. She saw how tired he was, how unbearably sad, how eager to let go. She recognised it from every cold, unrelenting, laughing moment of her own mirror.

"I suppose death can hold her breath for me."

"Yes!" Amber pulled him into the tightest embrace she could manage. "Now you’ve got to let me show you all the reasons you shouldn’t die. There’s a million of them. It might take us years!"

"Get your filthy unwashed hide off of me," Loki growled, but he was laughing and his own hug was rib-crushingly tight.


End file.
